


Shame

by Pigeonsplotinsecrecy



Series: Saving Mac [2]
Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Angst, Depression, Grief, Guilt, Mental Health Issues, Sadness, Shame, Suicidal Themes, Suicidal Thoughts, Trying to get better, hopelessness, macgyver create-a-thon, previous suicide attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-29
Updated: 2019-06-29
Packaged: 2020-05-28 19:02:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19400428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pigeonsplotinsecrecy/pseuds/Pigeonsplotinsecrecy
Summary: After his suicide attempt, Mac is still fighting negative thoughts about himself, and trying to figure out why he wanted to die.





	Shame

_“I've been beaten down,_  
I've been kicked around.  
But she takes it all for me.  
And I lost my faith, in my darkest days.  
She makes me want to believe.”

* * *

How was one supposed to answer the question: Why do you want to kill yourself?

Mac wasn’t sure there was a proper answer, not one anyone would care to hear because the people who loved him didn’t to want hear all the crazy things in his head because such knowledge would inevitably hurt them. They knew some of it, but he wasn’t sure they could handle all of it. They’d live with it; the knowledge wouldn’t make them want to off themselves, but if he told them how he really felt, they’d look at him like a bomb waiting to explode for the rest of his life, and Mac didn’t want to be seen as fragile. He just wanted to go back to normal, but he was starting to doubt he’d ever feel normal again because while that feeling he’d had that night on the bridge had calmed, it hadn’t disappeared. His therapist seemed unconcerned that the bad thoughts still lingered. She told him learning to deal with them was part of recovery, but he wasn’t so sure. Shouldn’t she be able to make them just go away?

A hopelessness still blocked his airways, making it impossible to breathe regularly. Everything in his life had gone from ordinary to Mac wasn’t sure what. Extraordinary wasn’t the right word for it, and nothingness felt right but didn’t make much sense because _something_ had to be there. Whatever it was, things were out of whack and he needed to put into words exactly what he was feeling. He wanted to scream the real reason he wanted to kill himself, uncensored. He wanted the whole damn world to know, but he stayed quiet because he was ashamed.

He was ashamed of the feeling of being too much for his skin, like an elephant being stuffed in a dollhouse, that feeling of containing too many emotions and carrying too many feelings. He wanted to disappear so he could stop feeling like he was an intruder wherever he went. The pressure on his skin made him feel like he was seconds away from popping open, letting his innards splat on the concrete. That would be a relief. He would do well if he could escape his body.

He was ashamed of the crazy thoughts cycling through his head. He hated how afraid he was to even think the wrong thing, let alone speak it. This never used to be a problem before. He never felt stupid for having an idea, but these days, it seemed like every idea he had was better off being kept in a dumpster in the back of his brain. His thoughts were valueless now, run into the ground by a lack of intelligent ideas. His mind was supposed to be his ally, so why was it such a burden? Why did Mac want to stop thinking, stop being smart, stop being anything but an empty vessel for a once living being?

He was ashamed of being so angry when he had no reason to be angry. Rage is what you get when you let all your feeling weave together, trying to force them to be nothing at all. It’s what Mac felt when the numbness settled in, when that mind blackening monster overtook him, but not the kind of anger where he would yell and scream. It was the kind of anger he kept to himself, compacting it like a rhino jumping on a five foot pile of snow. Quiet anger was the deadliest of all, that festering wound of self-denial, not allowing any expression of that simple seeming complex emotion. It was the façade of composure, and the basis for self-destruction. Mac had a good life, but sometimes, anger was the only feeling he could reach.

He was ashamed of all the things that used to make him proud. The things that used to make him happy had become things that made him feel like he ruined everything. Like when he broke someone’s phone because he needed a spare part from it. He knew the team didn’t mind, but it made him feel like a nuisance. He wondered if his inventions were even clever at all. Sure, they got them out of bad situations, but if Mac was smarter, maybe he could think of a better way that didn’t require blowing things up.

He was ashamed of all the guilt he had because he was guilty of many things. He’d been the reason countless people he loved had died, and worst of all, he had survived too many dangers. He was living on borrowed time as the people around him suffered. How many more people had to die before the universe evened things out and finally let Mac go? How many more times could he escaped death? Why hadn’t death gotten him yet when it had gotten people who were ten times more competent and all-around better people.

He was ashamed of being needy. Mac was sure he was draining to the people in his life, taking their energy each time he called to report a bad day or vent to them about his _feelings._ He practically lost his mind without Jack, which made Jack hop on a plane and come back home, interfering with important work. Mac took, took, took and had nothing to offer in return because what could he offer anyone other than a fixed toaster? He was better at destruction, tearing people and things down part by part.

He was ashamed of wanting to sleep all the time. He wanted to stay in bed all day. When he imagined peace, he imagined getting into bed and never getting up because sleep was the only time he didn’t have to think. He still dreamed and his brain still worked, but he had no control over what happened. His body took over, and he didn’t have to bear the heaviness of having to solve problems or navigate through the muddy waters of being alive.

He was ashamed of not being happy. He had the best friends in the world. He had a nice house. He had a good job. He was doing everything he ever wanted to do in the world— fighting against bad guys, but everything still felt so wrong. He had to force a smile on his face because no amount of good things could break through the chronic dread that weighed his body down like led, making him sore and achy from the exertion it took to try not to

He was ashamed of wanting to hurt himself because with all that all anger, he needed some kind of release, but the only one there was himself. That stupid person he saw in the mirror was the only one who deserved the pain he wanted to inflict. He needed to pierce through the numbness and let all those feelings he kept buried seep from his body. He couldn’t stand them, pushing whatever personality he had out of his body, replacing it with neuroticism. He wanted to inflict pain on the person he hated the most because wasn’t revenge the best medicine? He had to do something to the man who had ruined his life. He didn’t care if hurting that man meant hurting his own body with booze and pills, and cuts and burns. He didn’t do it a lot, but sometimes, he couldn’t help himself. It’s easier to be angry at himself than unbraid all his feelings.

He was ashamed of failing. He couldn’t even kill himself without messing it all up, and in the process, he put everyone he loved through unnecessary distress simply because he couldn’t keep himself together. Everything was falling apart and there wasn’t much he could do about it because every time he tried to do something good, it only seemed to make things worse. He wasn’t needed in the world. The last thing humanity needed was more explosions and chaos, which were the only things he ever created. Even when he was still in school, he’d ruined things— the whole football field he had leveled. All because he couldn’t get things right. People said he was smart, but a smart person wouldn’t get himself into so many dangerous situations. He’d find a way to solve the problem without explosions and gadgets made out of destroyed cellphones.

He was ashamed of being ashamed. He was ashamed of wanting to die. He was ashamed of being alive because he wasn’t supposed to survive. He was ashamed of everything that made up Angus MacGyver. He couldn’t think of anything more embarrassing than himself.

Most of all, he was ashamed of wanting better because he deserved worst. He deserved his shame. He deserved to feel too small for his skin, to be angry, to have no confidence, to feel guilty, to resent his own needs, to sleep his life away, to be sad, to hurt himself, to fail, to be ashamed, to die, and to suffer through life. He deserved it all, and every bad feeling life could hand him because he wasn’t worthy of being okay. He wasn’t worthy of even explaining to anyone why he felt so bad. He supposed that was why he wanted to die. Because of that deep shame he felt for never being enough. Mac should have been normal, but he couldn’t be anything more than fucked up. He was trapped in the veil of shame, putting a thin layer between him and the world he once loved and wondered if he could ever love again.

* * *

_“It was all the same, all my pride and shame.”_

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I've been posting a lot today. I hoped you liked this. Feel free to give feedback. Thanks for reading, lovely people.


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